Embodiments of the present invention generally relate to telecommunications and more specifically to techniques for alerting a user of unchecked messages before communicating with a contact.
In business and relationships, it is important to make efficient use of other user's time. With the many modes of communication available, it is possible for a user to leave messages in many different ways. For example, some of the modes in which messages may be left include instant messaging, voicemail, email, facsimile, etc. When a user calls a contact, it is possible that the contact has left a message for the user that the user has not checked. In some cases, the contact may have left a message that is on the topic that the user is calling about. The contact may then have to rehash the message. Accordingly, a contact may become annoyed and this is an inefficient use of user's and contact's time.
The use of different modalities of communication further complicates the situation. For example, if a user calls a contact from his/her cellular phone, the contact may have left a detailed message for the user on the user's enterprise voicemail. However, the user is not aware there is a new message from the contact because the user may be on his/her way to the office and therefore has not checked his/her voice messages at the office. The user may then just start talking to the contact and ask the contact for the same information that the contact has already left on the user's voicemail. Thus, in this situation, the contact can repeat the information over again or just tell the user to check the message. This conveys a bad impression of the user and in addition wastes the effort of the contact in leaving the detailed message.